You've Got to Be Kidding! Trivia Quiz

Answer: Let one of its arms break off

If a predator captures an octopus, the octopus will actually allow one of its arms to break off. The arm, which has the ability to change colour, will drift off thus distracting the predator. While the predator goes after the arm, the 'armless' victim (no pun intended!) will escape. So, will the victim be armless forever? Luckily no, the lost arm will grow back.

(I found this one out when I was helping my nine year old to do her homework. So thanks to www.globio.org for the information.)

Answer: Purple

Carrots have actually only been orange for the past 700 odd years. Before that they were purple. Interestingly, today, purple carrots are once again being cultivated and, according to Australian research, are a wonderfood - having been proven to contain high anti-inflammatory properties and antioxidants.

Also, for anyone interested in WWII, I found this interesting snippet on www.shareguide.com: "In 1940, Britain's Air Ministry invented the carrot myth, which was that a diet of carrots gave pilots night vision in order to see Nazi bombers attacking at night. This propaganda was spread to conceal the fiercely kept secret of Royal Air Force's interception radar, which was able to pinpoint enemy bombers before they reached the English Channel. The Germans fell for these lies because this myth was already a part of their folklore".

Great stuff.

Answer: Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day

Apparently the tradition started in 2001 when a couple of larrikin DJ's in Indiana joked about honouring the bubbly packaging material (which, incidentally, started out life as a wallpaper).

So what do you do on Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day? Well, you dress in bubble wrap, apparently. Or, if that's not your thing, you can, as many others do, sit and pop rolls of bubble wrap!

Answer: Waggle dance

There are actually two types of dances bees have to communicate. One is the waggle dance and the other is the tremble dance. In the case of the tremble dance, this is used to communicate that the forager bees are returning from their nectar run and the receiver bees need to go and collect it. I don't know about busy little bees, but they certainly are smart little bees!

Answer: Stamp

The actual stamp in question was the Treskilling Yellow. According to www.famousstamps.org and various other collector websites, the Treskilling Yellow is "widely recognised as the most valuable stamp" on earth.

The background of the stamp is that Swedish stamps were first printed in 1855 and among them were the three skilling stamps which were a turquoise/green colour. The Treskilling Yellow came about when a man named Georg Backman in Stockholm spotted one of the three skilling stamps, but instead of it being turquoise/green, it was yellow.

Just as a note, though, you couldn't hope to have a kilo of them, since the one found by Mr Backman was the only one ever found - but hey if you have any Swedish stamps lying around from the 1880s - you might just want to go and check them!

Answer: The first person you see after leaving your house

And the rather weird answer is: the first person you see after leaving your house. (Not a word I've ever had need to use in my lifetime, but there you go - there's a word for it anyway!) By the by, the others all have meanings for them too. Short and fat is pyknic; having a fat behind is steatopygic; and an urge to overcome melancholy by dancing is tarantism.

Answer: True

Strange but true. I learnt this on a holiday to Bali last year. Essentially the Balinese only have four first names. The firstborn is Wokalayan (which can be shortened to Yan), the second child is Made, the third is Nyoman or Komang and fourth is Ketut (sometimes cut short to Tut). Once you're up to child number five - yep - you start from scratch.

I guess parents save money on 'What To Call Your Newborn' books!

Answer: They showed the pandas videos of other pandas mating

Worried that pandas were in danger of extinction, the good folk zoologists in Thailand showed the reticent pandas videos of other pandas having sex - et voila, problem solved. In China, 31 cubs were born over a ten month period following adoption of the technique. (Oh, and Viagra was tried, but whilst it worked on human beings, it didn't do the job for pandas.)

Answer: Nippy Hug Day

On this (probably long awaited!) day, a male could demand a kiss from the woman of his choice. The woman could refuse if she liked, but if she did, the bloke had to right to pinch the girl's bottom!

Answer: True

(Before you read on, this is not for the faint hearted!).

Once I heard about this, I had to look it up, so thanks to www.wikipedia.org for giving the (rather gory) details.

This practice reportedly took place almost exclusively in northern Japan around the Yamagata Prefecture. And essentially, this is how you'd go about it if you wanted to slowly mummify yourself:

Firstly, you'll need to eat a special diet consisting only of nuts and seeds... for three years! At this time, you should be taking part in a regimen of rigorous physical activity so that all your body fat goes away.

Next, you'll need to eat only bark and roots - for another three years! At the same time, you should be drinking a poisonous tea made from the sap of the Urushi tree (normally found on the lacquer of bowls). By now you should be vomiting copiously and be experiencing a rapid loss of bodily fluids. If you've done this properly, you shouldn't have any maggots that might cause the body to decay after death.

How are we going so far? Well, it's not over yet. Next, you need to lock yourself in a stone tomb barely larger than your body, and stay in the lotus position. Luckily while you are in this tomb you have an airtube and a bell. Each day, you'll need to ring the bell to let people outside know you're still alive. So why do you need to let them know you're alive? Because when the bell stops ringing and you are patently dead (or too weak to ring the bell??) your air tube will be removed and the tomb will be re-sealed.

So there go you - do it yourself mummification.